The Riddle of Steel

"What is best in life?"

I was kindly approached to do the cover for the Collector's Edition of Barbarians of Lemuria. This one was for the hardcore fans who had backed the kickstarter at high levels.

Out of many concepts, the simple sword on black was chosen. No text. The people who have this would know what it was.

This is the sword of thr main hero, Krongar (essentially Conan). It is engraved with runes down its blade. I draped some teal beads around the hilt for some colour and interest (they're from a princess which he saved from a sea beast).

I rendered it quite highly, with loads of layers of textures painted on. I also added a little dynamism with some flames sparking out. I used a two-tone light effect to increase the depth. There is a blue light on one side and a red light on the other.

I'm pleased with how this came out.

Crimson Blades illustrations

Director's cut! Or Deleted Scenes!

Here are the internal inages which I did for the fantastic Crimson Blades 2nd Edition.

These are the unedited versions. The final pieces were all framed to fit into the same sized landscape and panoramic panels so they could slot straight into the final layout.

(I tweaked the final castle pic on the go, so it's sized into its border, hence no alternate version).

The game is a very 60/70's dark fantasy one and we focused on trying to maintain an aspect of that in the art.

It's fun getting to play with heavy blacks again.

Crimson Blades

Crimson Blades

Here is a blow-by-blow of process shots for the Crimson Blades cover which I did for Beyond Belief Games.

We wanted to invoke a classic pulp feel. Strong blacks, red and white were on the mood board.

I chose to overlay a painted texture on the blacks to give it more of a 60s/70s feel. To suggest the magic and mystery in the game. It also served to unify the design by bringing it together more. The original blacks popped a little too much.

All work done in Sketchbook on Galaxy Note.

The process is hopefully fairly clear from the shots, but if anyone has any questions, let me know.

Barabrians of Lemuria: Fantasy

BoL Fantasy

Here are my free and easy house rules for D&D à la BoL.
Just in case anyone is interested...

Barbarians of Lemuria: Force Awakens

BoL Awakens

I knocked up a super-quick one sheet for a Star Wars game set in the Force Awakens era. It's designed for use with the Barabrians of Lemuria rules.

It's just for a one-shot set in the underworld of the Outer Rim (just winging a criminal thing on a spacestation) so it doesn't go into great detail but I thought I'd share it. Feel free to use and abuse as you see fit.

Merry Xmas

Slaughter Beach

So, here is the cover which I did for Dark Minds' 'Slaughter Beach' by Ben Jones. It's a pulpy slasher of a thriller with a japanese twist.

I went for a bold design which would grab the eye; something which would grab you in a summer airport lounge or the like. I picked out a simple yet bold font to accentuate this aspect.

The kanji on the back is just the title in japanese. I drew it out and added some blood splats to convey the 'slasher-horror' feeling a little.

The palm trees took ages. But I didn't just want to use a generic stamp off the internet.

The skull in the moon was both quick and fun. I really enjoyed that part and am quite pleased with how it turned out. I love the pen strokes.

The final was compiled and converted to a pdf based on the provided dimensions. It was formatted for print at a high resolution.

Seeing it in the flesh was very satisfactory. Somehow it looks better as a physical object.

Get your own copy here:

Slaughter Beach